WEST AFRICA has become an attractive trade route for Latin America’s cocaine smugglers in recent years. On June 8th two tonnes (2000kg) of the stuff (with an estimated street value of over $1 billion) were seized in the Gambia.
The street value of 1kg of cocaine is $500,000 (from the above text). If the cost to manufacturer (if legal) were say $500, it means that a smuggler can spend more that $400,000 per kg of cocaine in technology, bribes and other such costs and still generate a HUGE profit. That is what ultimately drives the cocaine business. If the profit margins are so huge, it behooves us to come up with better (smarter) techniques to combat cocaine usage (there can be no smuggling without usage).
